Quint Studer speaks before introducing University of New Mexico professor of architecture Michaele Pride during CivicCon at the Rex Theater in downtown Pensacola on Monday, April 16, 2018.
Gregg Pachkowski/gregg@pnj.com

Quint Studer speaks before introducing University of New Mexico professor of architecture Michaele Pride during CivicCon at the Rex Theater in downtown Pensacola on Monday, April 16, 2018.
Gregg Pachkowski/gregg@pnj.com

Quint Studer speaks before introducing University of New Mexico professor of architecture Michaele Pride during CivicCon at the Rex Theater in downtown Pensacola on Monday, April 16, 2018.
Gregg Pachkowski/gregg@pnj.com

Quint Studer speaks before introducing University of New Mexico professor of architecture Michaele Pride during CivicCon at the Rex Theater in downtown Pensacola on Monday, April 16, 2018.
Gregg Pachkowski/gregg@pnj.com

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At center, Michaele Pride, a professor of architecture at the University of New Mexico and a CivicCon speaker, speaks to a group of community leaders before taking a tour of the Brownsville area on Monday, April 16, 2018.(Photo: Tony Giberson/tgiberson@pnj.com)Buy Photo

A bicyclist watched cars tear down West Cervantes Street for a few moments Monday morning, and after spotting a sizable gap between vehicles, he darted across four lanes of traffic to reach the other side.

He was one of the dozens of people who make the potentially deadly crossing every day, often times to fill basic daily needs like buying a drink, paying a bill or grabbing a bite to eat.

Michaele Pride watched from the side of the road with a contingent of citizens, public officials and health care and social service providers. Pride — a professor at the University of New Mexico and an architect whose work focuses on the intersection of urban design and health — pointed to the street as an example of why a community's design has a profound impact on its residents' health, safety and life expectancy.

"Design matters and all of our lives depend on it," Pride said.

Pride visited Pensacola on Monday as part of CivicCon, a joint initiative by the News Journal and the Studer Community Institute to help facilitate community conversations that can empower citizens to make Pensacola a better place to live, grow, work and invest.

University of New Mexico professor of architecture Michaele Pride speaks during CivicCon at the Rex Theater in downtown Pensacola on Monday, April 16, 2018.(Photo: Gregg Pachkowski/gregg@pnj.com)

She noted that research had found that an individual's community was often a more important factor in their health than their individual choices. For instance, it's difficult to jog in a neighborhoods with no sidewalks and roads built for high-speed traffic. It's tough to eat healthy meals regularly in neighborhoods that have an abundance of fast food joints but no grocery stores.

Among Pride's suggestions for making neighborhoods healthier and more beautiful included slowing down cars, inviting people to linger, planting trees and food, creating housing that is affordable for everyone and engaging the community in creative ways.

The reason for slowing down cars is evident in places such as Cervantes Street.

"We have fewer crashes, and the results of those crashes are less devastating," she said. "Fewer injuries and fewer deaths. So right there, what we do with our streets has an enormous impact on our quality of life and encourages us to engage in active living."

Since World War II, most cities and planners have built with the assumption that most people would be traveling by personnel automobile. According to the the National Association of City Transportation Officials, streets take up more than 80 percent of all public space in cities.

That means vast sections of the community are inhospitable for children who are too young to drive, elderly folks who no longer feel comfortable driving, people who have physical disabilities that make them unable to drive or people who just can't afford to own a car.

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Michaele Pride, a professor of architecture at the University of New Mexico and a CivicCon speaker, talks with a Dan Lindemann, right, on Monday, April 16, 2018, during a tour of the Brownsville area.(Photo: Tony Giberson/tgiberson@pnj.com)

By reclaiming those places and creating spaces where people can rest, linger and mingle, it increases the safety, health and sociability of a community.

"I think it's time for us to figure out a way to balance the infrastructure and priority of cars with that of pedestrians, cyclists, skateboarders and transit riders," Pride said. "It's not about getting rid of cars, it's about having balanced co-existence so that all modes have parity, people can get to where they want to go and they can be healthier."

Getting people to walk goes hand in hand with inviting them to linger. During her presentation, she pointed out numerous public spaces around the country where communities used benches, fountains, tables and other furniture to give people an incentive to stop, talk, rest and get to know others.

CivicCon logo(Photo: CivicCon)

Pride said when making decisions about a community's future, it was important for public officials and their agents to meet citizens where they already were when they were proposing projects.

She said people who typically go to meetings are older, white, middle class people with the resources and leisure to sit in a county meeting rather than being at work or raising children. She said they often represent "a very narrow slice of the community."

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University of New Mexico professor of architecture Michaele Pride speaks during CivicCon at the Rex Theater in downtown Pensacola on Monday, April 16, 2018.(Photo: Gregg Pachkowski/gregg@pnj.com)

Speaking to ways to engage citizens, Pride advised public officials to "go to where people are already, engage creative folks and do fun gatherings in public spaces."

She said initiatives like hosting a community meeting with fun activities, painting a bike lane on a busy road or transforming a vacant lot into a park or playground were cheaper than the cost of treating a sick community.

"Probably with the cost of one emergency room visit, we can probably transform an entire block and change the lives of 100 people," Pride said.

People who have ideas for improving the community may submit them to the Pensacola Center for Civic Engagement's "Empowering Neighborhoods" contest, which will provide up to $10,000 in goods and services to make a transformational neighborhood project a reality.

Next month, there will be two CivicCon speakers.

Emily Talen is professor of urbanism at the University of Chicago and will be in Pensacola addressing cities and social equity 6-7:30 p.m. May 9 at REX Theatre.